Mythology, Not So Inept

Written by Mathew Naismith

People like me don't just look at one peace of the jigsaw and live our lives in accordance with one or two pieces of jigsaw, the most desired parts of the jigsaw, we try to look beyond this. Put in another way, we tend to look at the bigger picture instead of the small picture, the small picture being a picture we desire to only to be observant of due to whatever bias we live by. It is easier to look at individual small pictures as the big picture is quite daunting, especially when it questions our own personal biases.

I was brought up in a western atheist environment, the ignorance that one has to religiously follow to stay an atheist is beyond words, also, atheism totally relies on a belief system to disbelieve in. A belief system to disbelieve in has to exist for atheism to exist!! Now, a belief system does not rely on a disbelief system to exist, belief systems exist on their own merits. I soon found through open mindedness and queries beyond what I desired that atheism simply represents one piece of the jigsaw. It matters not of what system of belief or disbelief you live by, it is still only one part of the jigsaw.

Mythology, to probably most people these days, is too fanciful to take note of, like the bible is becoming to a lot of people as of many other ancient teachings and texts. What if I said that the perception of God itself represents an ultimate state of consciousness, a supreme divine state of consciousness, were the ego has no say to what to stay unaware of. It is a state of consciousness that is all aware, not only aware of what it desires to only be aware of. So what does this make the lesser God's and Goddesses mentioned in Greek and Hindu mythology for example?

Each God and Goddess mentioned in mythology is represented by a particular consciousness, in other words a particular piece of the jigsaw that we may or may not live our lives by. To look at the jigsaw in a modern day way, multinationals represent one piece of the jigsaw, as with various belief and disbelief systems, as with communism or fascism, satanic cults, etc. Even if we are unaware of it, we are all of mythology, acting our our lives in accordance with a particular consciousness, while in a lot of cases denouncing or not living by the ultimate state of consciousness, the big picture, the whole jigsaw. It is amazing how many of us are living by one or two pieces of the jigsaw, while desiring to be unaware of the big picture, the ultimate state of consciousness. Don't get me wrong, most of the jigsaw, the big picture, is quite fuzzy to me as well, but I am aware of it's very real existence as of many other people.

Whenever I talk about a topic I am not totally familiar with, even though I have read books on a topic which is very different to living what you read or study, I look for people who are acknowledgeable of such topics. Notice I stated acknowledgeable rather than knowledgeable. Knowledgeable is to simply read or study. Being acknowledgeable is to also live what what one comes into knowing.

I wish to put a query to you Sreeram.

I look at Shiva as the supreme or ultimate state of consciousness, which to me would say that each God and Goddess mentioned, for example in Hinduism and Greek mythology, are a representation of lesser states of consciousnesses than of the ultimate state of God. It is that each God and Goddess represents a different conscious state that one may enter into. Does a Hindu look at it in this way?

It would seem that the western mind in all of us desires not to see Hindu and Greek mythology in this way.

Reply Sreeram: “Shiva is with attributes there is name and form in that aura which makes it Cosmic Consciousness.....just like how Sri Krishna showed his Cosmic form to Arjuna. While this Cosmic Consciousness should have mind to interact, we say Shiva pervades Mind. He is our External Guru who leads us to Absolute Consciousness which is void of attributes. The Pure Consciousness That is.”

Attributes refer to anything that is distinguishable or reflects attributes known to an entity, ego, like a God or Goddess in mythology that represents a certain type of consciousness. What religion is this God consciousness of that is mentioned in various religions? Unlike various other Gods and Goddesses that are more expressive of the ego, the ultimate state of this God consciousness has no actual distinguishable ego attributes itself, period, be it religious or otherwise. What occurs is that the ego gives the ultimate God conscious state distinguishable attributes, often only of their own belief system. This is when religion and/or church come before this ultimate state of God consciousness.

The Psychology of Mythology

Psychology is ultimately

mythology, the study of

the stories of the soul. 

 ~James Hillman~   

Written by Mathew Naismith

Mythology is about how we react and think within a world or environment, of course how we react and think in relation to an environment, comes down to our own psychology. Our own psychology simply determines the way we think, this is anything from science to religion or materialism to spirituality, etc. Of course one’s own psychology can be influenced by a number of different variables such as the different variables of science to religion for example. Often we judge a variable as mythology through one or two other variables such as science and materialistic ideologies. To me, it is a huge mistake to judge one variable by another variable, especially if we psychologically see another variable as an opposing variable. I cannot see any sustainable viable logical reasoning in this kind of bias by the psyche.

The psychology of mythology is all to do with good against evil, the difference to night and day, male and female interactions, how the weather determines our mood, moral and immoral behaviour, life and death etc. Mythology is to do with all of what life is and how we interact within this environment. Anyone who has conducted any kind of research on mythology impartially, realises that mythology isn’t simply about story telling as the following will clearly show.

https://www.psychologytoday.com/au/blog/cui-bono/201704/what-mythology-reveals-about-the-mind

Extract: Many years after the course was over, I would learn why. Apparently, narratives (stories) represent a particular way of constructing knowledge that comes naturally to us.

One writer has even gone so far as saying "Remembering is narrative; narrative is memory."

Research indicates that remembering a bunch of new, unrelated elements is difficult. But if the elements are part of a structured story, they are more easily remembered. That’s just the way the mind works. Research also indicates that memory is not a literal replaying of experienced events, like replaying a recorded video. Rather, it is a reconstruction of significant elements in a way that makes sense to us. We remember the past by making up stories in which the events relate to each other in a meaningful way.

My conception of science has changed over the years, partly because of my experience in my mythology course. I used to think that science was a way of establishing with certainty facts about the world, what is absolutely true beyond any doubt. As I read more about science and began to do science myself, I came to realize that in science we often attempt to model reality rather than establish indubitable facts. Scientific knowledge claims are always tentative and subject to revision. We strive for better models of reality, not just by looking for more facts, but by improving our insight and vision. A good scientific model is not one that attempts to capture every factual detail about reality, but is able to identify key variables that allow some accuracy in making predictions about the world. Just like a good myth provides enough insight about the world to help us navigate life's journey.

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Being variable in thought is to do with diversity or difference. What if we only looked at our environments scientifically or religiously, viewing our world through one or two variables only? Our whole reality is built upon one bias or another which is anything but of self-honesty. Of course there are ideologies that do incorporate various variables, even supposed opposing variables such as science and religion. In a reality conditioned to self-deception and self-dishonesty, any variable, such as isms and ideologies, too variable in thought are not going to be very popular. How popular are people like me today!!

How many of us looked and look upon mythology as something irrelevant in the modern age or have disdain for mythology period due to our own biases and self-dishonesties? This is while totally ignoring the obvious psychological importance of mythology. Is human consciousness evolving by not being diverse and different in thought? It is obvious, to consciously evolve we must be diverse in our thinking but many of us are doing quite the opposite at present. Of course psychology is only one variable that observes mythology as being worthy of consideration.

If you are interested in researching this further, the following should assist in this. Remember, like any variable, they all only answer one part of an answer as no variable on it's own has the answers to everything, only one part of the answer.                         

https://ejop.psychopen.eu/article/view/351/255

https://theartofenchantment.net/2016/09/08/the-psychology-of-mythology-or-why-the-otherworld-is-just-as-real-as-this-one/